Contemporary manufacturing facilities produce products that are often fabricated with numerous and complicated processes. Each process often performed on sophisticated process-equipment tools. Also, at various points in fabrication, the product is characterized with measurement tools to assure that it is within specified tolerances to maintain its quality.
In particular, the manufacture of electronic components involves the application of multiple processes requiring exacting control. To maintain quality, elaborate statistical process control schemes have been developed to keep manufacturing processes used to fabricate electronic components within specified tolerances. These schemes utilize a feedback loop between measured parameters of the product and the settings of the process-equipment tools used in fabrication. However, existing statistical process control schemes may lack the speed and complexity required to take full advantage of process yield improvements that can be provided by thorough-going analysis of the process data provided by these measurement tools.